This paper examines how Nathaniel Hawthorne's personal history as a descendant of Puritan ancestors shaped the themes of his major short works. Drawing on biographical context — including his family's role in the Quaker persecutions and his early loss of his father — the paper analyzes three stories: "The Birthmark," "The Minister's Black Veil," and "The Scarlet Letter." Each work is read as a vehicle for Hawthorne's ambivalent engagement with Puritan ideology, the nature of sin, the dangers of scientific hubris, and the irony of hidden versus publicly branded transgression. The paper concludes that all three stories reflect Hawthorne's lifelong struggle to reconcile Puritan belief with the cruelty carried out in its name.
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The life of Nathaniel Hawthorne was, on many occasions, played out in his stories, as his life events and experiences bled forth into his works and demonstrated the struggles the writer faced within himself. Running through the threads of Hawthorne's stories is the theme of Puritanism, clearly perceived in "The Scarlet Letter," "The Minister's Black Veil," and "The Birthmark." In order to understand Hawthorne's perspective, it is necessary to understand what Puritanism is, what it believes, and what it represents.
This is all-important because Nathaniel Hawthorne was born into a long line of Puritans. The cruelty of his own family affected him greatly as he attempted to come to terms with the beliefs of the Puritans and the fact that his ancestors had participated in the Quaker and witch persecutions — torturing and sentencing accused witches to death. As Rummel specifically notes, Hawthorne "tried to find distance from this face of Puritanism and lived Puritan ideology and philosophy in his own way" (Rummel, 1996, p. 1). Hawthorne believed that the "devil was evil in everybody. It makes people blind so they are not able to recognize the evil in themselves" (Rummel, 1996, p. 1).
Hawthorne is also reported to have lost his father at the age of four, when his father, "a sea captain was lost at sea" (Kesterson, nd, p. 1). This resulted in Hawthorne being "denied a father for a goodly part of his youth" (Kesterson, nd, p. 1). He did, however, have two uncles — Robert and Richard Manning — who served as surrogate fathers. Melville reviewed Hawthorne's works and stated that the nature and spirit evinced in his tales "argue such a depth of tenderness, such a boundless sympathy with all forms of being, such an omnipresent love, that we must needs say that this Hawthorne is here almost alone in his generation" (Kesterson, nd, p. 1). Melville further described Hawthorne as possessing "a great, deep intellect which drops down into the universe like a plummet" (Kesterson, nd, p. 1), and proposed that
"this great power of blackness in him derives its force from its appeal to that Calvinistic sense of Innate Depravity and Original Sin, from whose visitations, in some shape or other, no deeply thinking mind is always and wholly free. For, in certain moods, no man can weigh this world without throwing in something, somehow like Original Sin, to strike the uneven balance." (Kesterson, nd, p. 1)
Puritanism was first presented in the works of William Tyndale (1495–1536) and John Hooper (d. 1555), both of whom held that the English Reformation was advancing far too slowly. During the period between the reign of Elizabeth I and the death of Oliver Cromwell, Puritanism blossomed, as evidenced in the work of Cartwright (1535–1603) and Perkins (1558–1602), two Puritan philosophers. The distinctions between Puritanism and the Anglican Church were also formulated during this time.
When Puritans failed to achieve their desired reformation in England, they decided to construct a Puritan community that could serve as a model. The location chosen was New England, beginning the "Great Migration" in 1620 as these settlers set out for Plymouth (Rummel, 1996, p. 1). In actuality, the Puritans were successful in reforming both England and the English church, but their gains came too quickly and the movement suffered a reversal. Their parliamentary opposition to the royal court — described as "open warfare against Charles I in 1640" — resulted in the Puritans losing "their power and influence" (Rummel, 1996, p. 1).
The Puritans were subsequently persecuted alongside Republicans, Presbyterians, and Quakers; their services were prohibited, and they were banned from attending universities. Approximately 100 individuals who attended a Puritan service in 1567 were arrested, with 15 sentenced to prison. The Puritans eventually migrated from England in order to practice their religion freely. They believed in predestination for salvation and held that, while man could not save himself, he could still improve his own soul. Puritans were hard workers who attempted to live morally; many were quite wealthy, owing to their zeal for work, and they placed great value on education. While religiously strict, Puritans were also notably tolerant in certain respects. As Rummel observes, Puritans "condemned the drunkard, but not the consumption of alcohol itself."
Hawthorne's story "The Birthmark" has a background rooted in history: a man named Sir Kenelm Digby (1603–1664) killed his wife in an operation similar to the one that the character Aylmer performs on Georgiana. Hawthorne displays a deep distrust for science and scientists in this story, just as he did for politics and politicians. The story involves a beautiful woman whose husband believes she is perfect except for one minor flaw — a birthmark on her cheek. Georgiana was content with her appearance, but her husband's revulsion at the birthmark caused her to shrink from his gaze throughout the story, as she came to understand how deeply it disturbed him. The science practiced by Aylmer is alchemy, which occupies a position halfway between science and magic. In his attempt to make Georgiana perfect, Aylmer is effectively trying to act as God.
Georgiana's desire to become what her husband wanted led her to consent to his operation, which ultimately caused her death. Even as she was dying, she maintained that her husband had acted nobly, stating: "You have aimed loftily! — you have done nobly! Do not repent, that, with so high and pure a feeling, you have rejected the best that earth could offer" (Hawthorne, nd).
It is clear that Hawthorne deeply feared — if not openly derided — the potential of science in human life. His description of the room where Aylmer mixes his potions is dark and overbearing, reeking of evil. Hawthorne uses words such as "faith," "holy," and "heavenly" in relation to Aylmer, as though science has been transformed into a kind of religious practice. Aylmer attempts to deal with imperfection as though he were God, but fails to recognize that perfection on earth is not possible. The cost of his search is Georgiana's life, and as Hawthorne observes of the earth, the "great creative mother…is yet severely careful to keep her own secrets" (Hawthorne, nd). The only distinctly Puritan element in Aylmer's character is his endurance — the sheer persistence he shows in his long attempt to render Georgiana perfect.
"Black veil as symbol of secret sin and guilt"
"Hester's branded sin versus the minister's hidden guilt"
"Three stories unified by Puritan ambivalence theme"
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